Bagel Belly Blog

Deriding Rails

This is great:

the topic of which platform is best for development is as relevant as the topic of which motorbike is the best (Harley or Japanese) to a dolphin.

- comment on Douchebaggery

I know I said "the choice of best platform [...] can make a real difference", but ultimately Windows XP + Cygwin are usable tools. Sure, a Mac is nicer and a Linux box is more free (libre), but you can get your job done in any of them. And if you can't, you should consider learning transferable skills and not just specific toolchains.

Ultimately DHH's greatest achievement is not Rails, nor talking up the Mac, but simply getting the world to talk about him and pay attention. It's like the newspaper article that makes you shout "WTF? That's wrong! I must write a letter to the editor demanding they represent my opinion!" - ultimately, if they've engaged you and elicited an opinion or reaction, starting a conversation, they've done their job. You know you're going to buy that newspaper for the next week, until they print a retraction ... they know they've just sold one more week of dead trees.

There is no such thing as bad publicity ...

Technorati Tags: apple, branding, community, cygwin, debate, linux, mac, microsoft, ruby on rails, software, windows